There won’t be any disturbance in 911 calls in Glen Dale when the Marshall County 911 Center takes over all dispatch communications for the city starting Friday. Marshall County 911 Director Carol Robinson said callers should see faster response times on top of a six-figure savings in city coffers.

Glen Dale City Council recently voted to move 911 dispatch communications from the city to the county center. Officials said it was a cost-based decision that in no way reflected on the city dispatchers or their job performance.

The move should provide an annual savings of $325,000 in salaries, operating costs and replacing end-of-life equipment. There will be no new costs with the change.

Robinson said the transition from city to county took about three weeks and included just minor tweaks like transferring the phone lines to the county 911 center.

The faster response times should come from the fact that absorbing Glen Dale’s 911 calls reduces the process from two steps to one.

“It was a duplicated service,” Robinson said. “Those 911 calls would come to us originally and we would have to tell people to hold on as we transferred them to Glen Dale and they would have to say all their information again.

“That’s all eliminated,” she continued. “When we take the call, we dispatch it. There’s no transferring, no repeating, nothing.”

There will be a dispatcher each shift dedicated to answering calls from Glen Dale, Robinson said. The Marshall County 911 center already is at full staff, and will have no problem handling the dozen or so calls per night that come from the city, Robinson added.

Robinson added that a video phone will soon be installed outside the Glen Dale city building so people coming to the building after hours to talk to an officer or pay a ticket will be able to talk to a dispatcher and have an officer come by.

For non-emergency city business (permits, rentals, citation payments, court dates, pool passes, etc.), a clerk will be available at the city building Monday through Friday during business hours. The city’s business phone number remains 304-845-5511. Those with emergencies should dial 911. Any Glen Dale residents with home security systems or medical alarm devices, should contact their provider and update the contact phone number to ring directly into 911 instead of 304-845-5511.

The operations of Marshall County 911 are fully supported by the existing 911 fees collected monthly on every home and cellular phone bill and the Marshall County General County fund.